


The Hermit's Son

by landsail0r



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Family, Gen, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-26
Updated: 2016-01-26
Packaged: 2018-05-16 08:59:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5822473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/landsail0r/pseuds/landsail0r
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU where Obi-Wan raises Luke.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Hermit's Son

With a heavy sack of food in one arm and the baby in the other, Obi-Wan makes his slow journey back to the ship. Even squinting, his eyes sting from the hot and gritty wind. The baby is crying again. Luke—she had called him Luke, before she had fallen silent. Obi-Wan tries the name for the first time, his voice cracking slightly, but of course the baby does not understand.

He sets the food down on the floor of the ship and then sits down heavily, watching the heat shimmer over the nothingness outside. Luke has fallen silent. Just a few more days, he thinks, shaking the sand out of his hood. Anakin had family here, if you could call them that—a stepfather and half-sibling he had barely known. Luke will be safe with then, and then Obi-Wan can disappear.

 

He has slept three days in the cramped cockpit of the ship, waking every few hours to feed Luke or chase away thieves and scavengers who come seeking spare parts. Mos Eisley is this planet’s idea of a bustling city, but compared to Coruscant it feels oppressively small, and it’s no place for an infant or for a man looking to hide. Luke is watching him with wide blue eyes that look so much like Anakin’s; Obi-Wan cannot look at him for too long or else fire and screams begin to echo in his head.

Just a few more days.

 

His pockets are heavy with coin from selling the ship. It feels strange to carry money with him, but that is far from the strangest thing about this place. The woman who sells fried food in the market taught him how to tie a sling, and now Luke is pressed against his back, leaving his hands free to control the lumbering creature—an eopie, the salesman had called it. It purred and grumbled under the heavy load, moving frustratingly slowly, and Luke seemed to have been lulled to sleep by the gentle sway of its gait. 

Obi-Wan travels three hours outside Mos Eisley and sets up camp in a ravine, protected from the harsh winds and the harsh light of the setting sun. He does not sleep that night, stiffening at every sound, wrapping his fingers more tightly around his lightsaber every time he hears sand people in the distance. When he awakens, there are bruises on his fingers. He takes Luke out of the tent to watch the sun rising, and for the first time Luke smiles. 

Maybe he will wait until he’s settled in a bit to send Luke away. 

 

Building a house turns out to be much more challenging than he anticipated. Always fearing that some loose-tongued moisture farmer will stumble upon him, he does most of his labor without the help of the Force, though he breaks this rule a few times when necessary. Apart from occasional trips into town to pick up more supplies, Obi-Wan spends nearly all his time building. It feels good to throw himself into something with results he can see. He isn’t terribly good at it at first, but after a few collapsed walls and cracked stones he starts to get better.

The skin on his hands and his face grows coarser with the work and the omnipresent arid wind, but in the first week he has an alcove where he can sleep, and after a month the skeleton of the house is in place. Luke grows used to being carried on Obi-Wan’s back, and Obi-Wan grows used to talking to him as he works. He has never been one for quiet, and the baby’s tiny voice keeps the overwhelming silence at bay. Every night he plans to go hunting for Luke’s uncle the next day, and every morning he finds some project more pressing. 

He loses track of the days and weeks, constantly making improvements even when the bulk of the construction is finished. He does not realize that he has started smiling again until he catches Luke imitating him. Though he has little affection for Tatooine, he begins to understand it, to learn the names the settlers have for its fauna and to grow comfortable navigating its treacherous terrain. He learns to imitate the call of the krayt dragon to frighten the sand people away, and starts sleeping more easily after that.

One evening, as he is sitting by the fire with Luke, the child picks up a handful of sand and offers it to Obi-Wan. He takes it obligingly, saying “Sand!” emphatically as Luke watches with his big blue eyes. After thinking for a moment, Luke repeats “San’,” to himself. Obi-Wan begins to laugh as he thinks how disappointed Anakin would be in his son’s choice of first word, but laughter swiftly turns to tears nine months overdue. Luke does not seem to understand, and he says the word again, trying to take the sand back from Obi-Wan’s hand.

 

The house is completely finished just a few days after Luke’s second birthday; he only knows because he asked for the date the last time he went to town. He tries to not to think of it as the day that his closest friend burned, but it is impossible not to see Anakin in Luke’s eyes, in the way he smiles as he plays with the tiny toy sword Obi-Wan made for him. This time, I will succeed. 

It feels as if fate, against all odds, has given him a second chance. 

 

Obi-Wan had always laughed when Yoda spoke of how quickly the years pass as you grow older, but he was beginning to understand. It seemed only yesterday that Luke was learning how to walk, and now he is taking his first cautious swings with a practice saber Obi-Wan built from foraged parts. Despite his inexperience, Luke’s talent is obvious, and he quickly graduates from fighting droids to sparring against Obi-Wan, though they use sticks instead of sabers. 

Luke is fifteen when Obi-Wan finally realizes that the boy, strong and vibrant and kind, has surpassed Obi-Wan’s proficiency with the Force. They begin training less, practicing more as equals than as teacher and student, and Luke spends more time away from home. The emptiness starts creeping closer again, and sometimes when the house was empty Obi-Wan starts to see the fire around the edges of his eyes, to hear the screams of a man and a woman and two newborn children. He does not know the constellations of Tatooine, but he sometimes looks up at the sky and pretends he can see Alderaan. Luke knows he had a sister, but he doesn’t talk about her much, seeing the way Obi-Wan’s face hardens and his eyes grow distant.

Against all odds, Luke stays one year, and then another, though Obi-Wan can tell he is growing more restless. When he brings up leaving Tatooine to become a pilot, Obi-Wan does his best to encourage him, but that night the emptiness presses so close to him that he can hear it ringing in his ears. He is telling the truth when he tells Luke that they cannot afford passage off-world just yet. A few days later, seeing how dejected Luke is, Obi-Wan decides it is time to present him with his father’s lightsaber and the whole story.

Not two days later, two familiar droids unexpectedly arrive.


End file.
